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Frederator Studios
Frederator Studios is an independent American production company founded by Fred Seibert in 1997, with its first series launching in 1998. The studio focuses primarily on artists who write their own shorts, series, and movies. Their slogan is "Original Cartoons since 1998." The studio has locations in New York City and Hollywood. History The company was originally formed as "Frederator Incorporated" in 1997 (its first cartoons were released in 1998), and was housed at a temporary location of the Nickelodeon Animation Studios, in North Hollywood, California.1 Frederator's debut production was the cartoon short incubator, a television series called Oh Yeah! Cartoons, which later spun off three series: The Fairly OddParents, ChalkZone, and My Life as a Teenage Robot, in addition to 51 original short cartoons by a unique group of creators including the first films by creators like Butch Hartman, Rob Renzetti, Tim Biskup, and Carlos Ramos. Oh Yeah! Cartoons was based on Seibert's innovative What A Cartoon! series of shorts from Hanna-Barbera Cartoons and Cartoon Network, which brought Hanna-Barbera its first hit series in 10 years, Dexter's Laboratory, Johnny Bravo, Cow & Chicken, The Powerpuff Girls, and Courage the Cowardly Dog. In 2002, Frederator created a joint venture for pre-school cartoons with producer Susan Miller's Mixed Media Group, Inc. and produced their first pre-school series, Wow! Wow! Wubbzy!, which recentlywhen? featured Wubb Idol, a movie starring Beyoncé. Frederator Studios created a television series and competition The Nicktoons Film Festival (now known as the Nicktoons Network Animation Festival) for the Nicktoons network, which debuted October 24, 2004. On November 1, 2005, Frederator launched the world's first cartoon podcast,2 named Channel Frederator. This weekly animation network features submitted films from around the world, and quickly became one of the top video podcasts on Apple Inc.'s iTunes. In quick succession, The Wubbcast was launched for pre-schoolers in January 2006, and ReFrederator featuring vintage public domain cartoons in April 2006. Channel Frederator is now part of media company Next New Networks and reaches almost 4,000,000 video views monthly. On June 25, 2007 Variety article announced the studio had formed Frederator Films, dedicated to creating animated feature films budgeted under $20 million.2 Frederator's first feature is set up at Paramount Pictures, co-produced with J.J. Abrams' Bad Robot Productions. They have also set up their first two animated features in a first look production arrangement for Sony Pictures Animation.3 The studio jumped into its first original internet cartoons with independent animator Dan Meth. The Meth Minute 39 launched on September 5, 2007, featuring 39 of Meth's original character shorts. (The first cartoon was "Internet People," a video on the viral video sites YouTube and MySpaceTV that featured some of the best internet memes and internet people.) A spin-off, Nite Fite, debuted in October 2008. These series have totaled over 35,000,000 video views to date. Random! Cartoons is the latest from Frederator's series of short cartoon series, continuing its tradition of introducing big ideas and talent to the animation industry, running on the Nicktoons network in 2008-9. 39 original shorts have already spawned two hit series productions (Fanboy and Chum Chum for Nickelodeon, Fall 2009; and Adventure Time with Finn and Jake for Cartoon Network, Spring 2010). Category:Animation Category:Production Company